This invention relates to boat trailers, and more specifically to an automatic latching mechanism for attaching and holding a trailered boat to the receiving trailer.
One of the frequent difficulties encountered in trailering a boat is the necessity of assistance in aligning the boat to the trailer, and once so aligned, in affixing it to the trailer so that it may be removed from the water with the trailer.
Trailered boats, in general, are launched and recovered by utilizing a towing vehicle and submerging the trailer in water to a point where the boat may, in launching, be freely floated from the trailer when the latching device holding the boat to the trailer is released, and, conversely, upon recovery, the boat may be floated onto the trailer, held in place by an appropriate latching device, and, so secured, removed with the trailer from the water by the towing vehicle.
While apparently simple in concept, the recovery process becomes significantly more difficult when wind and water conditions are less then ideal. Recovery of a boat utilizing a trailer on a calm water surface, with no wind, in daylight and with assistance of others, may be accomplished quite easily with most available boat to trailer latching mechanisms, automatic or not.
Choppy water surfaces, cross-winds and night recovery situations, however, make recovery of a trailered boat a much more tenuous task, particularly when assistance is not readily available.
Various devices are available which ostensibly permit one person boat recovery operations, by providing some type of self-activating locking mechanism. However, for the most part, they presume conditions where, if assistance is not available, conditions will readily permit one person to align the boat, move it over the trailer and, in so doing, activate the locking mechanism. Available devices do not facilitate one-person recovery operations in less than ideal conditions.
Specifically, an optimal automatic boat to trailer latch must permit one-person operation, where water surface disturbance causes pitching which prevents point to point vertical alignment of the boat being recovered and the trailer for any significant period of time.
An optimal automatic boat to trailer latch must permit one person operation under cross wind conditions which prevent longitudinal alignment of the boat being recovered and the trailer during the boat's approach over the trailer.
An optimal automatic boat to trailer latch must permit one-person operation by a person either in the boat or in the water behind it in light or in darkness, by allowing that person to align the boat's bow with the latching mechanism and to observe when the latching operation is complete, without sacrificing control of the boat.
In many instances, sportsmen, recreational boaters, or commercial operators of small trailered boats must recover their craft without assistance. Recovery is often after dark or before dawn. Further, recovery, unlike launch, cannot wait for ideal water and weather conditions.
As noted, existing self-activating locking mechanisms for affixing boats to trailers do not satisfy the above requirements.